Frequently Asked Questions

Answers to com­mon­ly asked ques­tions about the Auen Foun­da­tion and our grant process can be found here.

Does the Auen Foundation accept unsolicited grants?

No, at this time, the only grants that the foun­da­tion will con­sid­er are those request­ed by Foun­da­tion Trustees or staff.

Do all grant applications begin with a letter of intent?

Yes. No grant appli­ca­tion will be reviewed until a let­ter of intent is pro­vid­ed to the Foun­da­tion Trustees, and they have approved the sub­mis­sion of a for­mal grant request. Please send a two page let­ter, along with a copy of the organization’s 501( c )( 3 ) cer­tifi­cate, a list of your cur­rent board mem­bers and oth­er fun­ders. With­in the let­ter, briefly describ­ing what your orga­ni­za­tion does, the pro­grams offered, the amount of grant sup­port you are seek­ing, and who the fund­ing will impact.

Let­ters of intent sub­mit­ted to the foun­da­tion are reviewed on a quar­ter­ly basis. Sub­mis­sion dates for review are Jan­u­ary 10, April 10, August 10 and Novem­ber 10. Let­ters must be received pri­or to the date in order to be con­sid­ered.

How do we submit a grant request to the Auen Foundation?

Once you have received a let­ter from the Foun­da­tion in response to your let­ter of intent, please review the grant sub­mis­sion infor­ma­tion on this web­site and fol­low the instruc­tions close­ly. Pro­pos­als will not be con­sid­ered for fund­ing with­out all of the request­ed infor­ma­tion ful­ly com­plet­ed.

Is there a scheduled time that the Grant Committee of the Foundation meets?

Grants sub­mit­ted to the Foun­da­tion are reviewed on a quar­ter­ly basis. Sub­mis­sion dates for review are Jan­u­ary 10, April 10, August 10 and Novem­ber 10. Grants must be received pri­or to the date in order to be con­sid­ered.

Once a grant is submitted, what are the requirements to resubmit?

Regard­less if the grant is approved or declined, we ask that you wait for one year from the date of fund­ing (or in the case of a declined grant, a year from the sub­mis­sion date) before sub­mit­ting again.

What is the Foundation’s granting region?

Eighty per­cent of our grantees are in South­ern Cal­i­for­nia and twen­ty per­cent may be con­sid­ered out­side of our area ONLYIF they are pro­pos­als solicit­ed by Foun­da­tion Trustees.

Can our organization apply for a grant if we have not yet received official tax-exempt status from the IRS?

No, the Auen Foun­da­tion does not fund a non­prof­it agency that can­not pro­vide us with a copy of its IRS deter­mi­na­tion let­ter. The IRS deter­mi­na­tion let­ter is an essen­tial doc­u­ment for your agency to prove its tax-exempt sta­tus. There are two types of let­ters an agency may have:

A cur­rent advance rul­ing let­ter that cov­ers a five-year peri­od for a new agency

A per­ma­nent final rul­ing let­ter

If you need help in deter­min­ing your sta­tus or obtain­ing your IRS deter­mi­na­tion let­ter, con­tact the IRS by call­ing 877–829-5500.

How long does the process usually take from the Letter of Intent stage to the final decision by the Foundation Trustees?

Allow one month for a grant request of $ 25,000 or less. Allow three months for a final deter­mi­na­tion of any grant request over $25,000.

Can our organization make a verbal presentation to the Grant Committee in addition to our application?

A pre­sen­ta­tion will only be sched­uled at the request of the Foun­da­tion Grant Com­mit­tee and are very rare. If a pre­sen­ta­tion is request­ed, an agency rep­re­sen­ta­tive will be required to pro­vide the Grant Com­mit­tee with a pre­sen­ta­tion of pre­de­ter­mined length with time allot­ted for mem­bers of Grant Com­mit­tee to ask ques­tions about the request. Appoint­ments will be sched­uled in advance.

Will representatives from the Grant Committee perform a site visit during the application process?

In addi­tion to thor­ough­ly review­ing your appli­ca­tion, a mem­ber of the Grant Com­mit­tee may sched­ule a site vis­it to assess your organization’s oper­a­tions and could also request to attend one of your agency’s board meet­ings as part of its due dili­gence.

Once a grant is made, what are the reporting requirements for the recipient organization?

When a grant is award­ed, we clar­i­fy the require­ments in the grant award let­ter as a con­di­tion of the grant. Every grant and agency is unique and so are the report­ing require­ments. The pri­ma­ry pur­pose of the reports request­ed is to sub­stan­ti­ate how your orga­ni­za­tion serves and ben­e­fits clients or pro­grams on an ongo­ing basis so we can under­stand how you are meet­ing the objec­tives of the grant request. Nor­mal­ly, report requests are based on 6 month incre­ments fol­low­ing the fund­ing of the grant, with a final report due upon com­ple­tion of the pro­gram goals.

Does the foundation fund matching and/or challenge grants?

Yes, the Auen Foun­da­tion encour­ages these types of grant requests. We work to facil­i­tate col­lab­o­ra­tion among agen­cies when­ev­er pos­si­ble, and feel that this type of sup­port enhances part­ner­ships.